Twelve Olympians
thumb|upright=1.8|Fragment of a [[Hellenistic relief (1st century BC – 1st century AD) depicting the twelve Olympians carrying their attributes in procession; from left to right, Hestia (scepter), Hermes (winged cap and staff), Aphrodite (veiled), Ares (helmet and spear), Demeter (scepter and wheat sheaf), Hephaestus (staff), Hera (scepter), Poseidon (trident), Athena (owl and helmet), Zeus (thunderbolt and staff), Artemis (bow and quiver), Apollo (lyre), from the Walters Art Museum.Walters Art Museum, accession number 23.40.]] In ancient Greek religion and mythology, the twelve Olympians are the major deities of the Greek pantheon, commonly considered to be Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, Demeter, Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Ares, Aphrodite, Hephaestus, Hermes, and either Hestia or Dionysus.Hansen, p. 250; Burkert, pp. 125 ff.; Dowden, p. 43; Chadwick, p. 85; Müller, pp. 419 ff.; Pache, pp. 308 ff.; Thomas, p. 12; Shapiro, p. 362; Long, pp. 140–141; Morford, p. 113; Hard p. 80. They were called 'Olympians' because they were considered to reside on Mount Olympus. Although Hades was a major ancient Greek god, and was the brother of the first generation of Olympians (Zeus, Poseidon, Hera, Demeter, and Hestia), he resided in the underworld, far from Olympus, and thus was not usually considered to be one of the Olympians. Besides the twelve Olympians, there were many other cultic groupings of twelve gods. Olympians The Olympians were the principal deities of the Greek pantheon, so named because of their residency atop Mount Olympus. They gained their supremacy in a ten-year-long war of gods, in which Zeus led his siblings to victory over the previous generation of ruling gods, the Titans. They were a family of gods, the most important consisting of the first generation of Olympians, offspring of the Titans Cronus and Rhea: Zeus, Poseidon, Hera, Demeter and Hestia, along with the principal offspring of Zeus: Athena, Apollo, Artemis, Ares, Aphrodite,According to Homer, Aphrodite was the daughter of Zeus (Iliad 3.374, 20.105; Odyssey 8.308, 320) and Dione (Iliad 5.370–71), see Gantz, pp. 99–100. However, According to Hesiod, Theogony 183–200, Aphrodite was born from Uranus' severed genitals, see Gantz, pp. 99–100. Hephaestus, Hermes, and Dionysus. Although Hades was a major deity in the Greek pantheon, and was the brother of Zeus and the other first generation of Olympians, his realm was far away from Olympus in the underworld, and thus he was not usually considered to be one of the Olympians.Hansen, p. 250; Morford, p. 113; Hard p. 80. The canonical number of Olympian gods was twelve, but besides the (thirteen) principal Olympians listed above, there were many other residents of Olympus, who thus might be called Olympians.Ogden, pp. 2–3; Dowden, p. 43; Hansen, p. 250; Burkert, p. 125. Heracles became a resident of Olympus after his apotheosis and married another Olympian resident Hebe.Herodotus, 2.43–44. Some others who might be considered Olympians, include: the Muses, the Graces, Iris, Dione, Eileithyia, the Horae, and Ganymede.Just who might be called an Olympian is not entirely clear. For example Dowden, p. 43, describes Heracles, Hebe, the Muses, and the Graces as Olympians, and on p. 45, lists Iris, Dione, and Eileithyia among the Homeric Olympians, while Hansen, p. 250, describes Heracles, Hebe, the Horae, and Ganymede as notable residents of Olympus, but says these were not "ordinarily classified as Olympians". Twelve gods Besides the twelve Olympians, there were many other various cultic groupings of twelve gods throughout ancient Greece. The earliest evidence of Greek religious practice involving twelve gods (Greek: δωδεκάθεον, dodekatheon, from δώδεκα dōdeka, "twelve" and θεοί theoi, "gods") comes no earlier than the late sixth century BC.Dowden, p. 43; Rutherford, p. 43;. According to Thucydides, an altar of the twelve gods was established in the agora of Athens by the archon Pisistratus (son of Hippias, and the grandson of the tyrant Pisistratus), in c. 522 BC.Rutherford, pp. 43–44; Thucydides, 6.54.6-7. The altar became the central point from which distances from Athens were measured and a place of supplication and refuge.Gadbery, p. 447. Olympia apparently also had an early tradition of twelve gods.Dowden, p. 43; Rutherford, p. 44; Long, pp. 58–62 (T 13), 154–157. The Homeric Hymn to Hermes (c. 500 BC) has the god Hermes divide a sacrifice of two cows he has stolen from Apollo, into twelve parts, on the banks of the river Alpheius (presumably at Olympia): :"Next glad-hearted Hermes dragged the rich meats he had prepared and put them on a smooth, flat stone, and divided them into twelve portions distributed by lot, making each portion wholly honorable."Long, pp. 61–62 (T 13 G), 156–157; Homeric Hymn to Hermes, 128–129. Pindar, in an ode written to be sung at Olympia c. 480 BC, has Heracles sacrificing, alongside the Alpheius, to the "twelve ruling gods":Dowden, p. 43; Rutherford, p. 44; Long, pp. 59–60 (T 13 C), 154–155. :"He Heracles enclosed the Altis all around and marked it off in the open, and he made the encircling area a resting-place for feasting, honoring the stream of the Alpheus along with the twelve ruling gods."Pindar, Olympian 10.49. Another of Pindar's Olympian odes, mentions "six double altars".Rutherford, p. 44; Long, pp. 58 (T 13 A), 154; Pindar, Olympian 5.5. Herodorus of Heraclea (c. 400 BC) also has Heracles founding a shrine at Olympia, with six pairs of gods, each pair sharing a single altar.Dowden, p. 43; Rutherford, p. 47; Long, pp. 58–59 (T 13 B), 154; FGrH 31 F34a-b. Many other places had cults of the twelve gods, including Delos, Chalcedon, Magnesia on the Maeander, and Leontinoi in Sicily.Rutherford, p. 45; Delos: Long, pp. 11, 87–90 (T 26), 182; Chaledon: Long, pp. 56–57 (T 11 D), 217–218; Magnesia on the Maeander: Long, pp. 53–54 (T 7), 221–223; Leontinoi: Long, pp. 95–96 (T 32), p. 157. As with the twelve Olympians, although the number of gods was fixed at twelve, the membership varied.Long, pp. 360–361, lists 54 Greek (and Roman) gods, including the thirteen Olympians mentioed above, who have been identified as members of one or more cultic groupings of twelve gods. While the majority of the gods included as members of these other cults of twelve gods were Olympians, non-Olympians were also sometimes included. For example, Herodorus of Heraclea identified the six pairs of gods at Olympia as: Zeus and Poseidon, Hera and Athena, Hermes and Apollo, the Graces and Dionysus, Artemis and Alpheus, and Cronus and Rhea.Dowden, p. 43; Rutherford, p. 47; Hard, p. 81; Long, pp. 58–59 (T 13 B), 141, 154; FGrH 31 F34a-b. Thus while this list includes the eight Olympians: Zeus, Poseidon, Hera, Athena, Hermes, Apollo, Artemis, and Dionysus, it also contains three clear non-Olympians: the Titan parents of the first generation of Olympians, Cronus and Rhea, and the river god Alpheius, with the status of the Graces (here apparently counted as one god) being unclear. Plato connected "twelve gods" with the twelve months, and implies that he considered Pluto one of the twelve in proposing that the final month be devoted to him and the spirits of the dead.Rutherford, pp. 45–46; Plato, The Laws 828 b-d The Roman poet Ennius gives the Roman equivalents (the Dii Consentes) as six male-female complements, preserving the place of Vesta (Greek Hestia), who played a crucial role in Roman religion as a state goddess maintained by the Vestals. List There is no single canonical list of the twelve Olympian gods. The thirteen gods and goddesses most commonly considered to be one of the twelve Olympians are listed below. Most listings include either one or the other of the following deities as one of the twelve Olympians. ;Notes Romans also associated Phoebus with Helios and the sun itself,North John A., Beard Mary, Price Simon R.F. "The Religions of Imperial Rome". Classical Mythology in English Literature: A Critical Anthology. (Cambridge University Press, 1998), p.259. .Hacklin, Joseph. "The Mythology of Persia". Asiatic Mythology (Asian Educational Services, 1994), p.38. . however, they also used the Greek name Apollon in a Latinized form Apollo.See, for example, Ovid's Met. I 441, 473, II 454, 543, 598, 612, 641, XII 585, XVIII 174, 715, 631, and others. According to an alternate version of her birth, Aphrodite was born of Uranus, Zeus' grandfather, after Cronus threw his castrated genitals into the sea. This supports the etymology of her name, "foam-born". As such, Aphrodite would belong to the same generation as Cronus, Zeus' father, and would be Zeus' aunt. See the birth of Aphrodite Genealogy See also * Dii Consentes, the Roman equivalent of the twelve Olympians * Family tree of the Greek gods * Interpretatio graeca, including a table of mythological equivalents * List of Greek mythological characters * Supreme Council of Ethnikoi Hellenes * Hellenismos * Olympia Notes References * Burkert, Walter, Greek Religion, Harvard University Press, 1985. . * Chadwick, John, The Mycenaean World, Cambridge University Press, 1976. . * Dowden, Ken, "Olympian Gods, Olympian Pantheon", in A Companion to Greek Religion, Daniel Ogden editor, John Wiley & Sons, 2010. . * Gadbery, Laura M., "The Sanctuary of the Twelve Gods in the Athenian Agora: A Revised View", Hesperia 61 (1992), pp. 447–489. * Gantz, Timothy, Early Greek Myth: A Guide to Literary and Artistic Sources, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, Two volumes: (Vol. 1), (Vol. 2). * Hansen, William, William F. Hansen, Classical Mythology: A Guide to the Mythical World of the Greeks and Romans, Oxford University Press, 2005. . * Hard, Robin, The Routledge Handbook of Greek Mythology: Based on H.J. Rose's "Handbook of Greek Mythology", Psychology Press, 2004, . Google Books. * Herodotus; ''Histories'', A. D. Godley (translator), Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1920; . Online version at the Perseus Digital Library. * Hesiod, Theogony, in The Homeric Hymns and Homerica with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White, Cambridge, MA., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1914. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library. * Homer, The Iliad with an English Translation by A.T. Murray, Ph.D. in two volumes. Cambridge, MA., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1924. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library. * Homer; The Odyssey with an English Translation by A.T. Murray, PH.D. in two volumes. Cambridge, MA., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1919. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library. * [[Homeric Hymns|''Homeric Hymn to Hermes (4)]], in ''The Homeric Hymns and Homerica with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White, Cambridge, MA., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1914. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library. * Long, Charlotte R., The Twelve Gods of Greece and Rome, Brill Archive, Jan 1, 1987. Google Books * Morford, Mark P. O., Robert J. Lenardon, Classical Mythology, Eighth Edition, Oxford University Press, 2007. . * Müller, Karl Otfried, Ancient Art and Its Remains: Or, A Manual of the Archaeology of Art, translated by John Leitch, B. Quaritch, 1852. * Ogden, Daniel "Introduction" to A Companion to Greek Religion, Daniel Ogden editor, John Wiley & Sons, 2010. . * Pache, Corinne Ondine, "Gods, Greek" in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Greece and Rome, Volume 3, Oxford University Press. 2010. . * Pindar, Odes, Diane Arnson Svarlien. 1990. * Plato, Laws in Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vols. 10 & 11 translated by R.G. Bury. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1967 & 1968. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library * Rutherford, Ian, "Canonizing the Pantheon: the Dodekatheon in Greek Religion and its Origins" in The Gods of Ancient Greece: Identities and Transformations, editors Jan N. Bremmer, Andrew Erskine, Edinburgh University Press 2010. . Online version * Shapiro, H. A., "Chapter 20: Olympian Gods at Home and Abroad" in A Companion to Greek Art, editors Tyler Jo Smith, Dimitris Plantzos, John Wiley & Sons, 2012. . * Thomas, Edmund, "From the pantheon of the gods to the Pantheon of Rome" in Pantheons: Transformations of a Monumental Idea, editors Richard Wrigley, Matthew Craske, Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2004. . * Thucydides, Thucydides translated into English; with introduction, marginal analysis, notes, and indices. Volume 1., Benjamin Jowett. translator. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1881. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library. Category:Twelve Olympians Twelve Olympians